THREE:486 Probably the reader will infer from the above letter that the king felt that the hour had come for him to die, and that he intended to resort to that most consummate act of folly and cowardicesuicide. He had always avowed this to be his intention in the last resort. He had urged his sister Wilhelmina to imitate his example in this respect, and not to survive the destruction of their house. Ruin now seemed inevitable. In the battle of Kunersdorf Frederick had lost, in killed and wounded, nineteen thousand men, including nearly all the officers of distinction, and also one hundred and sixty pieces of artillery. The remainder of his army was so dispersed that it could not be rallied to present any opposition to the foe.In his epistle Frederick had expressed the opinion that428 there was no God who took any interest in human affairs. He had also repeatedly expressed the resolve to Wilhelmina, and to Voltaire, to whom he had become partially reconciled, that he was prepared to commit suicide should events prove as disastrous as he had every reason to expect they would prove. He had also urged his sister to follow his example, and not to survive the ruin of the family. Such was the support which the king, in hours of adversity, found in that philosophy for which he had discarded the religion of Jesus Christ.
